Enlightenment:
Verse 6 is very interesting. “When He had said this, He spat on the ground and made clay of the spittle and anointed his eyes with the clay.” What He did was very strange. No one likes to touch a person’s spittle. But the Lord Jesus mixed His spittle with the ground and made clay. Then He used the clay to anoint the man’s eyes. The Gospel of John is a book of pictures, and this incident is a picture. We should not understand it merely according to the black and white letters. We must pray and look to the Lord that we may receive the true meaning.
The clay in 9:6, as in Romans 9:21, signifies humanity. Man is clay. We all are clay. What is the spittle? Spittle here, as something “that proceeds out of the mouth” (Matt. 4:4) of the Lord, signifies His “words which…are spirit and life” (John 6:63). Figuratively speaking, the spittle is the Word, which is spirit and life, that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord. The Word that proceeds out of the mouth of Christ is spirit. Thus, to mingle spittle with the clay signifies the mingling of humanity with the Lord’s living Word. The word “anointed” proves this, because the Lord’s Spirit is the anointing Spirit (Luke 4:18; 2 Cor. 1:21-22; 1 John 2:27). The spittle, then, signifies the Word, the outflow of the very element or essence of the Lord Himself. The clay was mingled with the spittle. This signifies that the Lord mingles His essence with us by and even with His Word. We are clay by nature, and the very essence of the Lord in the Word is the spittle. Formerly, when we were sinners, we were dead. When we heard the Word of the Lord, His Word came into us as those made of clay. When we heard and received the gospel, it was actually the spittle of the Lord that came into us, men of clay. In other words, the clay received something that proceeded out of the mouth of the Lord and was mingled with it.
The mingling of divinity with humanity is the most prevailing ointment on the whole earth. No other ointment can surpass it. The Lord anointed the man’s blind eyes with the clay that was mingled with spittle. This signifies the anointing of the Spirit of life. The anointing of the Spirit of life follows the mingling of the Lord in His Word with the clay. Immediately after you receive the Lord through His Word, there is the anointing of the Spirit of life. The Lord’s anointing the blind eyes with the clay made of His spittle signifies that by the anointing of the mingling of the Lord’s Word, which is His Spirit, with our humanity, our eyes, which were blinded by Satan, may have sight.